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The noise of rain splashes outside gets gently muffled, little by little…
Wait-wait-wait! But how that I cannot hear the surf any more?
In answer, there sounds a dry short click, the tooth in the upper valve locked into the dimple of recess in the bottom one…
Thick silence pervaded the narrow darkness. The deafening silence of a sound chamber and pitch-black impenetrability, copulated, engulfed all the world…
* * *
Bottle #5: ~ The Ways We Are Chosen By ~
29 years is a serious stretch, in the Soviet Union, as a result of the deep humanism in the foundation of the Communist regime, you'd hardly find a person sentenced to more than the 15-year term. No use trying. 15 was the ceiling, above that limit you straight off plopped to face the firing squad at ready for the execution. Each one has to do their job, you know.
In 29 years Nikita Khrushchev, who ruled USSR Empire 1953-1964, would have built in the Soviet Union 1.45 Communisms (that is almost one and a half of them) if not for the palace coup in the Central Committee of the CPSU. He got life within the walls of his personal dacha while the throne of the General Secretary was seated upon by Leonid Brezhnev to run the farm till 1982.
Which exculpatory circumstances—if any against so solid background—might mitigate my guilt of dilly-dallying about the production of RR (The Rascally Romance) protracted for so serious a stretch?
The confluence and most perplexing entanglement of differently varying yet similarly unfavorable exigencies determined the unbecoming lay-over.
To begin with, I okayed a war…
The choice at that time was not invitingly wide with the USSR engaged in just one war, in Afghanistan (1979 – 1989), however, its undisguised Communist-imperialistic nature ran counter to my beliefs and I subscribed to a pending war flagged off, in part, by my signature too.
The first war for independence of Mountainous Karabakh…
On entering the village club—a serviceable edification of raw stone used, a certain period back, to be the village church before the cross was brought down and rows of plywood seats went in together with the sturdy stage—dropped in in late evening by a dozen of mujiks to tarry over a couple of boards of chess and backgammon, and to chat of I dunno what because I hadn’t yet any command of Armenian, and where to, about once a month, they brought an Indian movie of 2 series—I was perplexed at seeing that crowd, thrice thicker than gathering for any movie. Which was not on at all that day.
The Village Council Chairman, delivering a speech from behind the breastwork of the on-stage rostrum, ofttimes was interrupted by vehement orators from the audience who just stood up from their respective seats so as to become seen and heard and who, in their turn, got interrupted by other orators up-springing from other seats… The common meeting of the villagers revved on at full swing.
Pargev, a ten-grader from the right seat next to me and also the Chairman’s son, elucidated that the purpose of the rally was to collect the folks' signatures and Grisha, the school Principal's husband on my left, added that such collection was the decisive instrument for breaking away from the Soviet Socialist Republic of Azerbaijan because living on as its constituent part grew utterly intolerable. Armenian drivers operating buses on the route Stepanakert-Agdam-Stepanakert were paid twice less than the Azerbaijani drivers operating buses on the route Agdam-Stepanakert-Agdam.
It should be kept in mind that never throughout my life have I driven any kind of bus and, additionally, that during my hitch in the Soviet Army, a construction battalion it was, our team of bricklayers reported to lance-corporal Alik Aliev (an Azerbaijani) while, simultaneously, I had a buddy plasterer Robert Zakarian, an Armenian from Third Company, because of my reckless not giving a fuck about racial differences as well as the lack of prejudices on the grounds of national affinity which also and always was another of my distinguishing features.
Life itself made me peek deeper into the historical aspect of the question and find out that Mountainous Karabakh (the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region during the Soviet rule) from the times immemorial was populated by Armenians whose huchkars (stone crosses) as well as churches being erected (also of stone) before and after the 10-th century AD prove it to the hilt.
Yet in early 20’s of the 20th century, when the 11th Red Army brought the Soviet rule to the Southern Caucasus, Mountainous Karabakh was handed over into the configuration of the Soviet Azerbaijan because of evidently empire-prone and, possibly, personal reasons adhered to by the then General Secretary Jugashvily, handled Stalin.
By the moment of my immigration, lots of Armenian had left Mountainous Karabakh and numerous Azerbaijanis moved into. Two of whom, for instance, had settled in the village of Seidishen where I was provided with the job of a village teacher by the Stepanakert Regional Department of People Education.
They were Biashir, the forester, and his son Eldar, engaged in delivering gas in 40-liter tanks to kitchens in the villages of the Askeran District by a truck rigged for the purpose.
There had even appeared purely Azerbaijani villages, about ten of them, in Mountainous Karabakh.
Being not aware of all that minutiae at the mentioned meeting, I still responded to the Grisha’s question in the affirmative as long as it concerned the right of peoples for self-determination. The right which is as fundamental as the freedom of assembly (hmm!), as inalienable as the freedom of speech (hmm-hmm!), as sacred as the freedom of thought and religion (someone shut me up please!)…
So naive and stupid idiot was I at that moment and scratched my signature among the uncountable autographs by others.
Four years later I confirmed the accord by taking part in the referendum on the Declaration of the Republic of Mountainous Karabakh.
That day Stepanakert was being bombarded without even the lunch break, nonetheless, I ventured to the town theater and ticked “for” in my voter ballot. And even today, with my status plunged down to that of a refugee, I’ve got no regrets because up till now that right seems so too attractive to my adamant mindset.